Love, Vows, and An Eccentric Woman
by itscailin
Summary: 'Oh, come on. Nobody listens to this bit anyway. I'm the bride for God's sake, and even I'm not listening to a word you're saying. "Repeat after me, James," the woman began, "I, James Arthur Potter, take thee Lily Evans." This is the part I'm supposed to listen to. Okay, shut up, brain! This is important' James' and Lily's wedding. Lily's POV. So fluffy you'll die. R&R!


_Oh, come on. Nobody listens to this bit anyway. I'm the bride for God's sake, and even I'm not listening to a word you're saying._

_Tick-tock, woman, my god!_

_Oh, this is just ridiculous. How much can there possibly be to say about the bloody marriage laws?_

_Are you even speaking English?_

_You know, I don't think you are speaking English._

"Repeat after me, James," the woman began, "I, James Arthur Potter, take thee Lily Evans."

_Shit, this is the part I'm supposed to listen to. Okay, shut up, brain! This is important!_

"I, James Arthur Potter, take thee, Lily Evans," James repeated carefully, enunciating every word properly and trying his utmost not to laugh or screw it up. I could see where he was having trouble trying not to laugh though, now that I was paying attention, because the image of the squat little witch marrying us really was worth a laugh, as cruel as it sounds; she was about a head shorter than me, and I was over a head shorter than James, so the height difference between the two was comical to start with – but in addition to that, she was wearing lemon yellow robes with a frilly lilac witch's hat, accessorised with little forget-me-not blue flowers around the rim of the hat and a pair of lime green shoes. And this eccentric little woman was dictating to _James _whatto say? Really?

"To be my lawfully wedded wife, to have and to hold from this day forward."

James stole a glance at me to find me smirking to myself at this woman, and he gave an odd sort of splutter as he said his next part of the vow, trying and failing, really, to keep from laughing. Sirius, standing next to him as his best man, was now silently roaring with laughter, looking at his shoes to keep it being too obvious and his shoulders shaking.

"To be my lawfully wedded wife, to have and to hold from this day forward."

"For richer, for poorer."

"For richer, for poorer."

"In sickness, and in health."

"In sickness, and in health."

"To love, and to cherish."

At this Sirius openly barked with laughter.

Everyone who didn't know him raised their eyebrows in inquiry as to why, exactly, the freak was laughing, whereas everyone who did know him simply rolled their eyes.

_Way to ruin the moment, Sirius._

"To love, and to cherish," James repeated, the humour gone now from his expression and a genuine warmth and happiness in it instead.

"Till death do us part."

"Till death do us part."

I smiled at him. Right then, Sirius, and everyone else in the room, ceased to exist for a moment. It was just us, smiling at each other in our moment of infinity, linked to each other by a beautiful, wispy golden thread in a figure of eight – so really, and infinity sign – around our wrists. It fit – the sign of infinity for the moment we knew that no matter what happened, whether the war killed us or not, we were infinite. I, for one, was not going to let anything, not even death, keep me from loving him. And I'm sure he felt the same.

But then it was my turn and I became very acutely aware of all the pairs of eyes on me. But I kept my eyes trained on James, on his lovely smile, and I said it all and the eccentric woman told James to proceed with the next part of our vows, the ones we'd written ourselves.

"Lily," he started, looking me in the eye. "I remember the day I first saw you. You were outside platform 9 and 3 quarters with your parents and your sister, but you and Petunia were fighting. And I remember, I thought you looked incredibly upset, but that you were also the prettiest girl I'd ever seen, girl germs aside for a moment."

This earned him a chuckle from our guests.

"And I remember telling myself I would never, ever make you look the way you did then. You were so pretty, but so sad and angry. I didn't want to ever make you feel that way. And then I spoke to you, and my foot got stuck in my mouth, and I said something stupid – I know, story of my life, right? – and I made you look like that. I spent the rest of my Hogwarts career trying to talk to you just once without putting my foot in it, but I didn't succeed for over 6 years. But you were worth the wait, Lils, never forget that. You were always worth the wait, and the chase, all of it. And that's what I'm here for today – to promise that for the rest of my life, I will remind you every day that you are my everything, and to promise you that I'll strive for the rest of my life to make you feel the exact opposite of what you felt that day. And that I'll promise to try to never put my foot in my mouth when it comes to you again – because now that I've got you, I won't let you go."

I had tears in my eyes. I had known, of course, that he had felt this way for me for much longer than I had for him, but I had no idea that from the age of _eleven_ – I had heard the guys make reference to how he had been "pining after me for more than six years", but I always thought they had been exaggerating. It was astonishing how he could remember so far back in so much detail and how much he loved me. It was amazing that someone like _him_ could love someone like _me_. _The bookworm and the Quidditch star? It doesn't really make logical sense, does it? _I couldn't get over how lucky I was.

Composing myself, I started my own vow.

"James. In general, James, I do not live my life with regrets. I don't regret that bad grade in third year Divination. I don't regret that my place at Hogwarts ruined my relationship with my sister, because magic is part of who I am, and I wouldn't change that even if I could. I don't need people in my life who can't accept me for what I am. I don't even regret my friendship with Snape. But you're a different story. I regret that it took me so long to realise how perfect you are for me, are in general actually. I regret that we didn't spend more time together. I regret that I told you I'd rather date the Giant Squid."

This comment earned me a few laughs from the guests, too, who had all, if not been there, heard about that particular day.

"Because not only do you accept me for who I am, but you love me for it, _and_ you love me for it in spite of the way I treated you for all those years. So today, I promise you that I will spend the rest of my life loving you, and beyond that, too. Death isn't going to stop me loving you, James. I promise to spend the rest of my life making it up to you for being a clueless idiot for so long. And I won't let you go, either, because even though it took me a long time, I realise now that we're meant for each other. I love you, James, always."

"Then," smiled mini-eccentric-woman, performing some sort of silent spell with complicated wrist action over our entwined hands, "I pronounce you, man and wife."

The threads around our wrists burst into gold confetti and leprechaun coins, and the woman told James he could kiss me, so he cupped my face with his hands and did so, lips moving softly against mine, both of us smiling into the kiss.

We broke apart, and looked around to see Sirius, beaming, with a camera in hand, that flashed before us just as we turned, grinning ecstatically.

_Lily Evans Potter. Lily Potter. I like that._

_Lily and James Potter, husband and wife._

**Lily** **and James Potter, the young couple who changed the wizarding world.**


End file.
